Keeping track of work, play, and your personal life can be a battle that’s almost impossible to win. Almost. If you’re having a hard time juggling your hectic schedule — which includes a full-time job, a family, a passion project, and proably about a million other things — you’ll be thrilled to know that there’s an app for that. Actually, there are a bunch.
Because while people may say you’ve got the same number of hours in a day as Beyonce, the truth is that Queen Bey has loads of people and services around her that help free up her time. You might not be flush enough to hire a personal assistant, but with these time-saving apps, you can cut down on the wasted minutes in your day and stay organized, not to mention sane.
After a few weeks you won’t know how you lived without them! Basically, it’ll be like the Valencia filter all over again. Here are 11 time-saving apps that will change your life:
Waze
If you commute to work in a car, Waze is your new best friend. The app saves masses of time by delivering real-time traffic and road updates from a community of actual drivers –– ensuring that you get to work in a relatively decent mood and don’t get side-eyed by your boss.
Office Lens
There’s nothing worse than hunting down an ancient 90s-era copy machine on the rare occasion that you need to scan a document. Office Lens turns your phone into a scanner, lets you trim down documents, and even creates images (or editable Word docs) from whiteboards.
Wunderlist
Think of Wunderlist as the ultimate to-do list –– or, in iPhone terms, as a vastly superior version of Notes. Wunderlists are breeze to share with friends, family and colleagues, making it easy for everyone to stay in the loop.
24me
Can’t afford a personal assistant? Download 24me, the absolute best personal assistant app out there. The app’s super-easy interface aggregates everything in your life in one place, from calendars, tasks, notes, and personal accounts. You can even pay bills with it –– and did we mention it’s free?
RescueTime
If you’re like the rest of the internet-addicted world, you probably spend way too much time trolling Buzzfeed and Facebook when you could be getting work done. RescueTime keeps track of the time you spend on apps and websites, and then reports back to you. The results are often shocking, so prepare to cut down on your Twitter usage.
FullContact Card Reader
Business cards are a valuable tool for networking, but they’re also a huge pain to keep track of. FullContact’s card reader scans business cards into iPhone contacts and has them transcribed by real people who verify their accuracy. Never carry a card in your pocket again!
Shoeboxed
Cut down on the amount of paper in your life with Shoeboxed. Instead of balling up receipts and saving them in, well, a shoebox, the app will scan and extract all relevant information and organize it into the most common tax categories. And yes, it also generates expense reports.
RedLaser
This app is the ultimate shopping companion. Use RedLaser to scan barcodes and find the best prices, coupons, and deals within seconds. It’s shocking how much money this app can save you.
CudaSign
Do you spend a lot of time signing documents? CudaSign does the work for you! This app uploads docs to your phone, lets you sign with your finger, and allows you to email the signed material to anyone in your contacts list. How did we go so long without this?
Shyp
Move over, UPS. Next time you need to mail something, try Shyp. The app will pick up your item, pack it for you, and send it anywhere in the world using the cheapest, most reliable shipping option. You don’t have to do anything except sit back, relax, and marvel at how much time you’re saving.
SwiftKey
There are few things worse than having your texts autocorrected by iPhone, but SwiftKey learns your typing patterns and eliminates the frequency of typos –– saving you tons of time hitting the “back” button in the process. It’s a must-download.
